Category Archives: Data

The purpose of the Guide to DHS Statistics is to provide transparent documentation to users to assist them in understanding DHS datasets and to enable them to reproduce the statistics in DHS reports. DHS surveys collect a wealth of information on a wide range of topics from a representative sample of the population in the countries that participate in The DHS Program. For each country, the information collected is processed, tabulated, and presented in a report that describes the living conditions and the demographic and health situation in the country.

Many of the procedures involved are straightforward and are familiar to demographic analysts. However, other procedures need special attention and have been developed based on experience accumulated over many years regarding the preferred way of calculating certain indicators, what to guard against, and what not to forget.

Who is the guide for?

The Guide to DHS Statistics is meant to be a tool for all data users: for those just starting out in data analysis and for those with advanced skills who need a tool for checking procedures. It is intended to serve as a reference document for those directly analyzing DHS data as well as for users who desire a deeper understanding of indicator definitions. The tool can help those who use DHS data to monitor and evaluate programs and assist in informed decision-making.

What’s new in this version of the guide?

The updated Guide to DHS Statistics serves as a replacement for the old tool, but also as an expansion. Though it provides the same basic indicator definitions and calculation information as the original tool for the indicators used in DHS-4, the new guide goes far beyond the original content by adding the many new indicators and topics that are now covered by the DHS-7 tabulation plan. New features in the guide include variables, details of numerator and denominator calculations, discussions ofchanges over time, links to other relevant data use tools and resources, and links to API indicator data. Complex indicators include examples or figures to facilitate understanding. View an example of an indicator page here.

Where can you find the guide? What else can you expect?

The new guide was a team effort of many DHS Program staff members, and the result is a document that is available as a PDF and online as an interactive tool. In the near future, the guide will be expanded to include chapters on female genital cutting and fistula. The tool will be continuously updated as the DHS core questionnaires and tabulation plans change to ensure that data users always work with the most up-to-date reference guide to the universe of DHS data.

Anyone can contribute to these goals by spreading the word. Share the infographic below, and don’t forget to stay connected by using #GlobalGoals throughout the week. Explore the indicators described in the infographic and more in one easy-to-read table using STATcompiler.

World Breastfeeding Week, held annually from August 1-7, is a week where over 180 countries come together to promote and support breastfeeding. And although World Breastfeeding Week 2018 has come to a close, you can still take part in advocating for breastfeeding and its role in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals with DHS data:

Use STATcompiler to discover and share the prevalence of exclusive breastfeeding for children under 6 months.

Use STATcompiler to discover what percent of children age 6-9 months are breastfeeding and consuming complementary foods.

Share and retweet the new World Breastfeeding Week 2018 infographic using DHS data from 5 recently released Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS).

The DHS Program has collected breastfeeding data for over 30 years and has more than 50 breastfeeding indicators available in 80+ countries on STATcompiler. Continue to share DHS data on breastfeeding and stay connected for updates and resources!

We are pleased to announce the release of the 2015-16 India National Family Health Survey (NFHS-4) Final Report and State Reports. This nationally-representative survey was conducted in over 600,000 households and interviewed both women and men to collect information on population, health, and nutrition indicators. NFHS-4, for the first time, also includes measurements of blood pressure and random blood glucose, and provides district-level estimates for all 640 districts, in addition to national and state-level estimates for most important indicators.

The National Malaria Control Program (NMCP) in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) recently reoriented their communication strategy around insecticide-treated nets or ITNs, moving from a focus on behavior change around ITN use to a focus on net care and repair to extend the life of existing ITNs. Why the change?

The 2013-14 DRC Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) showed that only 50% of the household population had slept under an ITN the night before the survey, an indicator they wanted to improve. But when they dove deeper into ITN use, interpreting it in the context of ITN access, a different picture emerged. The survey also found that 47% of the population had access to an ITN. Interpreting these two indicators together, the NMCP redefined their strategy with the understanding that people were using the ITNs they had, and since use was higher than access, more than two people were using each net. In this context, the behavior change messages needed to be targeted toward helping people extend the life of their ITNs.

This kind of data use is only successful when decision makers understand the indicators that are informing their policies and programs. Our new course on K4Health’s Global Health eLearning (GHeL) Center, Measuring Malaria through Household Surveys, dives into the major malaria indicators, guiding learners through the process of collecting and calculating these indicators and through considerations for their interpretation.

The DHS Program has continuously sought to develop tools and curricula to strengthen the capacity of stakeholders to use survey data. From the survey report and dataset to STATcompiler and the mobile app, from tutorial videos to the user forum, and from one-day Data to Action workshops to advanced data analysis workshops, we are always innovating to meet users’ needs.

Last year, The DHS Program developed a Malaria Indicator Trends workshop curriculum to increase the capacity of data users from National Malaria Control Programs to utilize DHS/MIS data to answer key programmatic questions and to accurately interpret trends in malaria indicators. The workshop targets users who needed more information that could be provided in a one-day dissemination workshop but does not have the skills (or need) to analyze with STATA. It was immediately clear that this workshop, which dives into each of the recommended indicators, their calculation, their limitations, and considerations for their interpretation, was meeting a need for data users. The next step to increase the well-informed use of these important indicators was to expand the reach of this curriculum through an online course on the Global Health eLearning Center platform.

This free course targets professionals (both generalist staff working on malaria as well as those with programmatic expertise in malaria) from donor agencies, ministries of health, and implementing and collaborating agencies. It takes 2-3 hours to complete and can be taken as a part of the Monitoring & Evaluation or Infectious Diseases certificates offered through the GHeL center.

When the indicators from household surveys are better understood, better programmatic decisions will be made.

Did you know The DHS Program has made changes to the collection, calculation, and terminology used for maternal and pregnancy-related mortality data? Our new three-part video series based on our blog post addressing changes to the DHS-7 questionnaire breaks down everything you need to know.

The first video in the series, the Maternal Mortality Ratio (MMR) Indicator Snapshot, is our newest Indicator Snapshot. Based on the recently revised MMR definition, this video covers important things to know, why maternal mortality matters, calculation, where to find it in DHS reports, and how to use MMR in a sentence.

The second video details the differences between The DHS Program’s definitions of maternal and pregnancy-related mortality, as well as how our definitions compare to WHO’s definitions.

The DHS Program estimates of pregnancy-related mortality ratios (PRMR) have limitations which can make interpretation difficult. The final video in the series discusses how to interpret trends in PRMR, as well as other DHS survey indicators which may be more useful to program managers and policymakers.

You can find these videos and other resources on the Maternal Mortality page of our website. Did you find these video helpful? Need more guidance? Let us know in the comment section below!

Journalists worldwide use DHS, MIS, and SPA surveys as source data for essential stories – stories about domestic violence, HIV prevention, and child survival. Coverage of these topics brings awareness to these critical issues and often prompts policy change.

In any given month, DHS Program data are cited in hundreds of print, television, radio, and digital media across the world. While we can’t possibly review and share every example of accurate DHS data coverage in the news, we do highlight some of the best examples in The DHS Program’s News Room. The results from India’s 2015-16 National Family Health Survey have been featured in India’s biggest newspapers, and topics range from anemia prevalence to child marriage. A recent article from the Midrand Report in South Africa cites condom use data from the 2016 South Africa Demographic and Health Survey as an argument for voluntary male circumcision, and a Ghana News Agency article highlights adolescents’ needs for reproductive health services.

Using data from a reputable source like a DHS survey adds credibility and context to journalistic reporting. But covering topics such as mortality, fertility, and disease prevalence is not simple, and journalists often struggle to interpret DHS survey results and write about demographic and health data in language that is accessible for their audiences. Following a survey’s national release, The DHS Program’s dissemination team facilitates a workshop to educate journalists on reading and understanding DHS tables, accessing comparable data, and using data in reporting. Learn more about these media trainings in this reflections piece on a Journalist Workshop in Togo.

We are pleased to showcase a new mini-tool on our website that allows you to quickly interact with indicators for topics such as family planning, gender, malaria, and nutrition. We have preselected 10-15 key indicators per topic that you can view by country or globally.

Simply navigate to your favorite topic to see a trend visualization from the most recently released survey. Then, select either a country or indicator within the drop-down menus to instantly see results. To start over, click “Reset” to return to the featured trend graphic.

With the 1,000s of demographic and health indicators available, grouping key indicators by topic allows you to quickly interact with DHS data. Visit The DHS Program Topics page for a list of the featured topic pages containing the mini-tool.

What other topics do you want to see? Let us know what you think in the comments section below! Don’t forget to subscribe to The DHS Program newsletter for more updates on our digital tools, surveys, and more.

Have you ever wondered if high-levels of precipitation affect birthweights and infant and child survival? Is increased use of insecticide-treated bed nets associated with lower incidence of malaria? Do children in households near battle zones or other violent contexts have higher levels of child malnutrition? Do some staple crop regimes promote better health outcomes than others?

Now with IPUMS-DHS, you can easily study these questions and others on how environmental and social contexts affect human health and behavior.

Using GPS coordinates, we’ve linked contextual variables drawn from many data sources directly to individual DHS survey respondent records. All context variables describe the features of a small geographic area (5-10 kilometers) surrounding each DHS survey cluster location.

New variables include:

Environmental
Variables

Agricultural
Variables

Social
Variables

Soil type

Ecoregion

Level of vegetation

Precipitation

Proportion of land area used for agriculture or pastureland

Total harvested area and yield for 17 major crops

Dominant livelihood

Population density

Counts of violent episodes

Incidence of malaria

Keep checking back! Over the next year, IPUMS-DHS will still be adding more contextual variables, including summary statistics calculated from large census-based samples.

Plan a new research project linking individual characteristics and outcomes with the surrounding context, and let us know about it. We’re always eager to hear how people are using IPUMS-DHS!

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IPUMS-DHS is a system that makes it easy to find and review the thousands of DHS survey variables and to download a single fully-harmonized data file with precisely the variables and samples that interest you. The system currently includes variables from all DHS survey samples taken in India and 22 African countries; more samples are constantly being added.

For DHS survey samples with GPS cluster data that are not yet in IPUMS-DHS, the contextual variables are available in linkable CSV files.

A lot can change in 20 years. For The DHS Program, it’s the difference between over 250 datasets for 70 separate surveys to more than 10,000 datasets from over 300 surveys. The contents of the model survey questionnaires changed radically, as did the media used for data distribution. And two decades ago, the internet had only recently emerged as a potential means of communication around the world!

It might be hard to imagine life without internet access today – for us, we rely on the internet for many of our activities. In 1995, The DHS Program established a website which had the basics: an informational brochure, survey statuses, fact sheets, press releases, and newsletters.

Though the website has been updated several times since then, it still has these basic features. The crucial difference lies in how we only provided an archive of publications and data and information on how to place an order for them. Yes, users had to pay for the cost of media – which, at the time, included diskettes (AKA a floppy disk), Bernoulli cartridges, and CD-ROMS – and shipping. At one point, we were deciding on whether to charge for the data itself, to ensure the fullest use of the data.

That decision was part of a proposal from 20 years ago, which proposed the following data dissemination over the internet:

These look familiar, don’t they? Today, both reports and datasets are free and available over the internet for download (though we still require users to apply for access to datasets), we email our newsletter to subscribers (which includes news, new publications and datasets, and articles that have cited DHS data), and the User Forum has been live since February 2013.

The DHS Program has utilized the internet beyond what was proposed 20 years ago; to name only a few ways, the creations of STATcompiler, development of eLearning courses for data visualization and social media for global health, and utilization of social media to engage with our users. And if you want to know what is coming next, be sure to Follow or Like us on social media, subscribe to our newsletter or even this very blog– you are just a few clicks away!

This blog post is based on the rediscovery of the paper prepared for the Population Association of America (PAA) meeting back in 1996. Go back in time and read the original paper here!

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